Greetings,
I have been lurking this forum on occasion for a year or two. Have spent dozens of hours reading the last few months.
I tend to analysis paralysis most any financial decision until I’m blue in the face.
Last year, we sold our home in suburbia, purchased a ranch and an RV to live in while we build a barndominium
Our barndo materials have arrived, our permits are trickling in, and we are prepping to pour foundation.
We are at 6000ft elevation, northern Arizona with plenty of sunshine and fairly constant breeze/wind
We are installing our own septic, we have a 490ft deep well, and power will consist of solar and propane along with a generator
I’m not able to conduct load tests while building, and frankly likely will not be able to prior to the home completing. We are still accumulating the necessary electrical appliances and scrutinizing each item, but again…don’t have real numbers, just ballpark ideas
What I did do was researched national consumption averages, inquired with my in laws who live in the local area (we were previously 150 miles away at 1200ft elevation and 115 degree summers) and analyze 18 months of power usage in my prior home, calculating peaks and averages, as well as considering different dynamics vs our new home. For example AC needs are far less, whereas heat will be higher
It appears as though we traditionally hovered with an average of 35k/daily. This was a 2 story, 2200sq ft stucco home that was about 20yrs old and positioned front door east. Back door west. I’d love to use half that, but I have no idea if that’s realistic. I do know that I will use substantially less
Our barndo is metal framed, walled, and roofed. Monolithic slab foundation, 6:12 roof pitch, a modest 40x70 enclosed building with 10ft wall height. 40x40 will be climate controlled living and 40x30 is for the shop. So we are have 1600ft living space and 1200ft shop to power
The building is oriented long ways N/S. The south gable end wall has a 12ft roof extension/patio. Our living room is on this wall and has a 12x8 triple sliding door. The goal with the patio was to avoid direct sunlight into the windows during summer and take advantage of the direct radiant heat with lower level sun in the mornings and evenings of winter. The north wall has a door as well to create a natural breezeway in effort to behave similar to how old southern homes were designed when weather is optimal/warm. Moisture barrier and spray foam insulation on all 4 walls and roof. The walls are blue but the roof is a light tan in hopes of reducing additional radiant heat.
Our equipment shed will be roughly 60ft from the home. Due west. The solar array will be immediately in front of (south) the shed. I had hopes of a dual purpose shed. 1 to function as my pump house for my well pump and pressure tank on one side, and the solar inverter and bank on the other. I do have concerns about water proximity so I’d be curious to hear if others have done similar. This would be a well insulated shed with any required temp mitigation. I was thinking a 10x20 or similar sized shed.
I’m planning on running a multi head mini split hvac with 1 head in each of the 3 bedrooms and 1 in the great room area (4 total). Alternatively I’ve been considering running a mini split thru air handler so that in winter time we can circulate air more effectively as the wood stove is located near center of the home.
The shop has a 3hp 60gal air compressor and a Hobart multiprocessor 200 inverter welder.
The range, dryer, and water heater will all be propane and we have a 500 gallon propane tank. We’d like to run a standard residential fridge, dishwasher, washing machine, and chest freezer. Outside of that, id say just typical home power. Family of 4. 2 TVs in the house, 2 gaming PCs, no cable subscription, no fancy countertop appliances outside of the norm, LED bulbs, starlink, etc.
I’d like to plum the generator directly to the tank as well. I was looking at the champion 8.5kw and 12.5kw standby generators but haven’t purchased anything yet. The 8.5 is intriguing as the engine size is roughly half as large and is rated for better fuel consumption
Whew. Sorry for being so wordy. Just adding background/context as much as possible.
For my solar this is what my mind has been thinking and wanted to gain feedback on
I’ve been debating on 2-schneider xw 6848s or a sol ark 15k.
It seems in the end, I’d have similar output capacity with the schneider potentially offering better surge capacity.
Batteries I’ve been on the fence between 8-SOK 48v 100ah and 4 Trophy 220ah
Either way, I think that I’d like to go Lifepo4 and hope to start with 30-40kw of bank
Panels, not picky. Looking for local options. Would hope to find something with wattage of 380+ to minimize the number of panels. Was thinking an array of 10-12k (like 28 410w or 32 380w panels)
The schneider would provide me redundancy and component parts as well in the event something fails.
Does this sound like a feasible/realistic system to meet our needs based on the info above? What would you do different? Any opinions to sway the inverter choice? Cost isn’t significantly different between the two and it seems like one of the most paramount pieces of the puzzle
I have been lurking this forum on occasion for a year or two. Have spent dozens of hours reading the last few months.
I tend to analysis paralysis most any financial decision until I’m blue in the face.
Last year, we sold our home in suburbia, purchased a ranch and an RV to live in while we build a barndominium
Our barndo materials have arrived, our permits are trickling in, and we are prepping to pour foundation.
We are at 6000ft elevation, northern Arizona with plenty of sunshine and fairly constant breeze/wind
We are installing our own septic, we have a 490ft deep well, and power will consist of solar and propane along with a generator
I’m not able to conduct load tests while building, and frankly likely will not be able to prior to the home completing. We are still accumulating the necessary electrical appliances and scrutinizing each item, but again…don’t have real numbers, just ballpark ideas
What I did do was researched national consumption averages, inquired with my in laws who live in the local area (we were previously 150 miles away at 1200ft elevation and 115 degree summers) and analyze 18 months of power usage in my prior home, calculating peaks and averages, as well as considering different dynamics vs our new home. For example AC needs are far less, whereas heat will be higher
It appears as though we traditionally hovered with an average of 35k/daily. This was a 2 story, 2200sq ft stucco home that was about 20yrs old and positioned front door east. Back door west. I’d love to use half that, but I have no idea if that’s realistic. I do know that I will use substantially less
Our barndo is metal framed, walled, and roofed. Monolithic slab foundation, 6:12 roof pitch, a modest 40x70 enclosed building with 10ft wall height. 40x40 will be climate controlled living and 40x30 is for the shop. So we are have 1600ft living space and 1200ft shop to power
The building is oriented long ways N/S. The south gable end wall has a 12ft roof extension/patio. Our living room is on this wall and has a 12x8 triple sliding door. The goal with the patio was to avoid direct sunlight into the windows during summer and take advantage of the direct radiant heat with lower level sun in the mornings and evenings of winter. The north wall has a door as well to create a natural breezeway in effort to behave similar to how old southern homes were designed when weather is optimal/warm. Moisture barrier and spray foam insulation on all 4 walls and roof. The walls are blue but the roof is a light tan in hopes of reducing additional radiant heat.
Our equipment shed will be roughly 60ft from the home. Due west. The solar array will be immediately in front of (south) the shed. I had hopes of a dual purpose shed. 1 to function as my pump house for my well pump and pressure tank on one side, and the solar inverter and bank on the other. I do have concerns about water proximity so I’d be curious to hear if others have done similar. This would be a well insulated shed with any required temp mitigation. I was thinking a 10x20 or similar sized shed.
I’m planning on running a multi head mini split hvac with 1 head in each of the 3 bedrooms and 1 in the great room area (4 total). Alternatively I’ve been considering running a mini split thru air handler so that in winter time we can circulate air more effectively as the wood stove is located near center of the home.
The shop has a 3hp 60gal air compressor and a Hobart multiprocessor 200 inverter welder.
The range, dryer, and water heater will all be propane and we have a 500 gallon propane tank. We’d like to run a standard residential fridge, dishwasher, washing machine, and chest freezer. Outside of that, id say just typical home power. Family of 4. 2 TVs in the house, 2 gaming PCs, no cable subscription, no fancy countertop appliances outside of the norm, LED bulbs, starlink, etc.
I’d like to plum the generator directly to the tank as well. I was looking at the champion 8.5kw and 12.5kw standby generators but haven’t purchased anything yet. The 8.5 is intriguing as the engine size is roughly half as large and is rated for better fuel consumption
Whew. Sorry for being so wordy. Just adding background/context as much as possible.
For my solar this is what my mind has been thinking and wanted to gain feedback on
I’ve been debating on 2-schneider xw 6848s or a sol ark 15k.
It seems in the end, I’d have similar output capacity with the schneider potentially offering better surge capacity.
Batteries I’ve been on the fence between 8-SOK 48v 100ah and 4 Trophy 220ah
Either way, I think that I’d like to go Lifepo4 and hope to start with 30-40kw of bank
Panels, not picky. Looking for local options. Would hope to find something with wattage of 380+ to minimize the number of panels. Was thinking an array of 10-12k (like 28 410w or 32 380w panels)
The schneider would provide me redundancy and component parts as well in the event something fails.
Does this sound like a feasible/realistic system to meet our needs based on the info above? What would you do different? Any opinions to sway the inverter choice? Cost isn’t significantly different between the two and it seems like one of the most paramount pieces of the puzzle
